“The more you know, the more you know you don’t know.” It may be Aristotle’s most famous musing – long since appropriated by campy motivational posters and college Philosophy majors trying to impress – but its best application might just be as nutritional advice. The more scientists have studied what constitutes a healthy diet, the more complicated the answer has become.

Today, there is so much conflict haunting lunchtime that a writer of dramas might call the whole thing overwritten. Do you opt for a trendy bowl of tuna poke, despite knowing that the tender pink tuna is contributing to the overfishing of our oceans while being laced with mercury? Or do you choose to indulge in a juicy grass-fed cheeseburger, ignoring its mammoth sized environmental impact that requires 28 times more land to produce than chicken or pork? A simple avocado and veggie sandwich on whole wheat might do, if you can turn a blind eye to the countless novels that have been written about wheat and its negative effects on high blood sugar, cholesterol storage and fat production, and don’t even get me started with the deforestation problems that plague those buttery green slices of avocado.

Eventually, we all have to choose something to stamp out our hunger. Because of this, we tend to cherry pick data to support our own biased nutritional claims. After all, tuna does have healthy fats; grass-fed cheeseburgers have protein and heart-healthy conjugated linoleic acid; whole wheat bread has fibre and avocado is still better than mayonnaise!

The truth is that everyone’s genetics are different, and any diet that presents itself as the only answer to the complex problem of human nutrition is a diet woven out of red flags. Multiple studies, including one published in the journal Cell, which found that people metabolize the same foods differently, and another in the journal PLoS One, which found DNA based dietary advice is a greater means of improving health – have indicated that we should eat according to our genetic makeup, not according to any one stop shop Miracle Diet.

A scene from What the Health.NP/Netflix

However, these findings haven’t stopped Netflix from releasing vegan filmmaker Kip Anderson’s latest project, What The Health, a documentary that serves as an extended PETA promotion on the life-altering benefits of veganism.

From a scientific standpoint, What The Health should be immediately disqualified for holding a pre-existing bias. Throughout the documentary, Anderson actively seeks out evidence in support of veganism while ignoring endless scientific literature offering a differing perspective. Eventually, he arrives at several ill-informed half-truths about the dangers of meat and dairy.

Anderson begins by noting the statistic that over 17 million people die every year from cardiovascular disease. It is the leading cause of death around the world, he says, before his team of vegan experts weigh in on the troubling fact. “When we speak of heart disease, I would say the role of alcohol is pretty small. The role of sugar is very small, too,” says Dr. Neal Barnard.

.Becky Guthrie/National Post

“When we eat these kind of dead meat bacteria toxins, within minutes you get this burst of inflammation within your system, such that basically paralyze your arteries. You get this stiffening in the arteries, cutting their inability to relax normally in half,” adds Dr. Michael Greger.

After using the meaningless and fear-mongering term “toxin” without explaining what it means, an infographic pops up onscreen to “illustrate” this misinformation. It features a spiky green, sausage-shaped character – presumably the “meat toxin” – bouncing off a cell wall. Eventually, the wall spurts its own green growth until two mysterious rows of chemtrails shoot through it and the sausages float along with the unaffected red blood cells.

The reality is that when physicians started noticing a surge of patients with cardiovascular disease in the 1920s and 1930s, it had little to do with a sudden boom in animal consumption – never mind spikey sausage-shaped meat toxins. Industrialization led to an increase in processed, calorie-dense foods and partially hydrogenated vegetable oil shortenings like Crisco, which was marketed as being more “digestible” than conventional animal fat. The resulting increase in processed food consumption has been well documented as the culprit for the rise of cardiovascular disease. A 2016 study published in the journal American College of Cardiology confirmed that rates of heart disease increase as countries develop and the accessibility of packaged foods high in refined grains, added sugars, salt and unhealthy fats increase.

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Not to be outdone, Anderson also solicits certified nutritionist Kimberly Snyder to articulate the dangers of animal product consumption for pregnant mothers. As becomes routine throughout the documentary, Snyder relies heavily on the vague and menacing idea of “toxins” in her illegitimate account of maternal health, exploiting the anxieties of a demographic already pre-disposed to dietary concerns.

The documentary also includes several success stories from adults that have gone vegan and have since lost weight, stopped taking medications and somewhat magically found themselves transformed with makeovers that include a brand new face full of makeup. While the weight loss is promising, it is not limited to the magical ability of veganism alone.

Anyone who transitions from a standard North American diet full of processed sugars and fats to one that is full of whole foods is going to improve their health. A cohesive vegan diet can help with this just as much as an omnivorous diet that focuses on nutrient-dense whole foods.

Perhaps the most ridiculous claim the documentary makes occurs when the filmmakers equate eating an egg with smoking five cigarettes – because both are “type 1 carcinogens.” Aside from the fact that anyone with the tenacity to compare eggs to smoking shouldn’t be allowed to give medical advice, eggs are not even classified as carcinogens by the World Health Organization. The myth that the saturated fat found in eggs raises cholesterol, eventually leading to cardiovascular disease, has been debunked by multiple studies, including those published in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition and The BMJ.

Amidst all of this nonsense, What The Health does manage to make two successful points: Anderson notes that processed meat can lead to cancer and that factory farming is a cruel practice that needs to stop. My question here is: was anyone arguing otherwise? The World Health Organization classified processed meat as a carcinogen in 2015, and repeating the point with dramatic background music hardly qualifies as news.

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No carnivore – no matter how much they believe in the transformative power of filet mignon and foie gras – can successfully argue that a factory farm using antibiotics is beneficial to human health. Sure, What The Health is correct in asserting that going vegan is one way to stop supporting this dangerous type of factory farms. However, a plant-based diet does not ensure immunity against the antibiotic-resistant superbugs linked to the use of antibiotics in animal agriculture.

“You can be a lifelong vegetarian and suffer from the consequences of drug-resistant bacteria that have been caused by breeding poultry and pork,” says Ramanan Laxminarayan, senior researcher scholar at Princeton University who co-authored a study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences about the increasing use of antibiotics in animal agriculture.

If What The Health does any good it will be in illuminating the benefits of a plant-based diet to a wider audience. Many factory farms are a grisly solution to the problem of increasing meat consumption, and meat is a luxury product that many of us could stand to eat less of. However, no diet is tailor-made for everyone, especially not one that preaches the safety of excess carbohydrate and sugar consumption for cardiovascular health.

Food is an emotionally charged subject, which is what makes it so difficult to talk about critically with others who do not share similar dietary beliefs. But regardless of your stance on animal cruelty, sugar or veganism, the fear-mongering that flows through What The Health will not help anyone’s personal health. It will only contribute to even more nutritional anxiety and confusion. What the Health, indeed.